Alvarez to seek damages, says lawyer

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Wrongfully deported Australian woman Vivian Alvarez could return
to Australia from the Philippines within days, her lawyer George
Newhouse said today.

Former Victorian Police commissioner Neil Comrie today handed
down a damning report into Australian Government bungles that led
to Ms Alvarez being wrongfully deported to her native Philippines
in 2001.

She was found living in a hospice for the dying, north of
Manilla in May, but accepted advice not to return until a package
of adequate government support was negotiated.

Mr Newhouse today said the Government had agreed to a
process that could allow Ms Alvarez to receive taxpayer
subsidised care for more than six months after she returned to
Australia.

"We're finalising arrangements with the Federal Government and
we're hoping that they'll be concluded very quickly now that
Comrie's report has been handed down, and that Vivian will be
returned within a matter of weeks, if not days," he told
reporters.

"The initial concerns that we had with her care package ...
accommodation and basic care, [were that they] would end after six
months.

"The Government's now agreed to a process where that could be
extended and I don't want to go into details of that process."

Ms Alvarez would also be seeking compensation from the
Government, Mr Newhouse said.